


Let's Play Pretend

by shopfront



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Journalism, Community: ouat_exchange, F/F, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Getting Together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-13
Updated: 2013-01-13
Packaged: 2017-11-25 08:30:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/637002
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shopfront/pseuds/shopfront
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Emma gets stopped trying to sneak into an event in that sexy red dress, and Regina needs some arm candy, it's a perfect match. Journalist!AU, fake dating.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Let's Play Pretend

**Author's Note:**

  * For [faithgrowsold](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=faithgrowsold).



"Oh hell no," Emma muttered under her breath when a firm hand hooked her elbow and pulled her out of the crowd. 

It was the biggest event of the year, and inside were countless political and business players just begging to be featured in a story by _Emma Swan, new reporter for the Storybrooke Daily Mirror._

Plastering her biggest, dumbest smile on her face, Emma gazed up at the black suited security guard and subtly cocked a hip to make the skirt of her best red dress ride up a little further. "Yes?"

"Name?"

"Mary," Emma offered after a beat, batting her eyelashes a little. Inside she gussed loudly over not having an alias name ready for security, but her smile never slipped. It was such a rookie mistake, she was better than that and it was probably going to cost her a story. Goddammit.

"Last name?" was all the guard intoned flatly in response.

"Oh come on now," Emma smirked, and leaned in to flash some boob and press her hand against the man's chest. "I don't need a last name, you can't really tell me you don't recognise me?"

The guard looked down at her hand, and then calmly grasped her by the wrist and pushed her away. 

The corner of her lip turned down into a tiny frown as he pressed his hand against his ear piece and repeated her fake name, as well as a brief physical description, and then listened intently.

Clearly her seduction skills had gotten a little rusty.

Sighing, Emma turned her head to watch at the crowd inching up the path and through the big double doors she'd been aiming for herself. She'd been so damn close. Carefully she noted down who was arriving as she waited, whether they were newsworthy, and who they were speaking to as they went. 

It wasn't much more than any reporter lackey behind the red tape could see. But if all she managed to get out of this damn dress was a closer glimpse of the handshakes and initial wheeling and dealings of the city's powerful, it would just have to do.

The guard spoke into his head set sporadically for a long time, long enough for Emma to visually sweep the slow moving crowd multiple times and then get bored. 

Emma gently tugged on her trapped hand, and then sighed when the guard didn't release his grip even a little bit. She looked around again, this time more casually, seeking anything interesting or out of place. A few new faces joined the back of the crowd, and she filed them away in her head.

Then she stopped, blinked, and frowned. A woman was gazing straight back at her from just inside the doorway, clad in sleek black with hair to match and an inscrutable expression on her face.

"Right. You're not on the guest list, so you'll have to leave" the guard said, interrupting Emma's staring match and beginning to march her back towards the kerb.

"Wait," Emma cried. "You don't-"

"Excuse me." The silky voice cut through the noise of the crowd effortlessly, stopping them both dead in their tracks.

The guard straightened his shoulders noticeably, and tightened his grip on Emma. "Ms Mills," he said, voice as stiff as his back.

"Sorry to interrupt, Graham." 

It was the woman who had been watching. Emma gaped a little as she took in the smooth bounce of her curls and red of her lips up close, and the slightly terrifying smile that was spreading across her lips. 

"I see you've bailed up my date, so I'm afraid I'll have to take her off your hands. If you don't mind...?"

She offered an arm to Emma as she spoke, as slick as anything despite both of Emma's arms still being trapped at her sides by the security guard. Not that they were for long, as the woman sharply raised an eyebrow in query and the guard sprang back a step.

"I didn't realise," he said, manfully attempting to mask a discomfort that made Emma's inner reporter sit up and twitch. On the outside, however, she only subtly tugged her hemline back into place and edged towards her saviour. "My apologies."

Ms Mills inclined her head, and then turned her back on him completely. Her full attention was now pinned on Emma, who under the force of that gaze found herself busily resisting the urge to either defiantly raise her chin or melt back into the crowd.

"Shall we, my dear?" She leaned in to murmur in Emma's ear, arm still aloft for Emma to hold.

And Emma Swan, who all at once wanted both a big byline and to see how long it might take to mess up the lines of that black dress or that perfect lipstick, breathed deep and reached out to take her arm.

*

The room they walked into was cavenous and sparkling, and despite her best intentions to stay focused on the job, Emma caught herself feeling a little overwhelmed by all the glitz.

"What do you think? Is it too much?" the woman by her side asked, cutting through Emma's daze with a smug quirk of her lips that clearly stated she thought it was perfect exactly as it was. "I asked for tasteful, discrete even, but there's just no stopping some people."

_No stopping you,_ Emma thought, but when she opened her mouth something entirely different came out. "It looks amazing, Ms... Mills, was it?"

"Call me Regina," she said, pulled Emma close to whisper conspiratorily in her ear while she nodded polite hellos to other attendees. Her hand slipped from Emma's arm to grip her firmly by the waist as she guided them through the crowd. "You are supposed to be my date to the ball, after all."

Her breath brushed the curve of Emma's ear with each word, making her shiver, which in turn made Regina's lips quirk up further.

If Emma was honest with herself, she hadn't really considered the logistics when she'd grasped hold of Regina like a drowning swimmer grasped a lifebuoy. But if she had, Emma wouldn't have expected to spend the rest of the evening by Regina's side. What would Regina want with a sparsley clothed, somewhat uncouth woman at a polished social event like this one?

Sure, Emma could be charming. She was counting on it to ferret out a story or two, after all. But she usually only sustained it for short periods of time, and she fully expected Regina to get bored and cut her adrift. 

Just hopefully without calling security back to collect her.

But for some reason, she didn't. They spent the evening swinging between one group of important people and another (and another), introducing Emma as Regina's partner with each new greeting. 

Many people that she'd only previously seen in photos and their names in print included her in small pleasantries and confidences. So much so that she quickly found total strangers nodding hello to her during the short stretches she was apart from Regina.

Each time they swung close to the restrooms as they traversed the huge room, Emma slipped away. She shut herself in a stall and hurridly scrawled down everything she could remember in the tiny notebook she had tucked into her garter, then flushed the toilet and checked her hair before diving back into the throng.

"I just can't keep hold of you, can I?" Regina had murmured after her third disappearance.

After that Regina had made sure to only steer them around the centre of the room. Emma had tried to excuse herself on the pretext of going to the bar to collect drinks for them both, but Regina had pinned her in place with an intent stare and imperiously beckoned over one of the wait staff instead.

"I can't bear to spend a minute without her," she'd laughed to their current circle of gossipy socialites.

Her eyes were fixed on Emma's lips and her hand caressed the small of Emma's back as she spoke, and for a moment the room just faded away. 

Emma'd had to shake her head to clear it, and then blush obligingly (and wasn't it a good thing Regina was still staring at her so intently, as if she wanted to eat Emma up like one of the many tiny, delicious canapes on offer) like she was shy and bashful instead of off her game and distracted.

It was everything she could have hoped for, and more than she'd dared to expect. Except for the way that Regina would then swing her off to greet someone else before she could properly grill the last person.

She had so many notes, but nothing of substance. 

There was nothing ground breaking, only fluff for an event piece in the social pages. She almost suspected Regina of doing it deliberately, like she knew what Emma was up to.... 

But then someone else was asking how they met and remarking on how delightful they looked together, and it slipped her mind in favour of clinging closer to Regina's side and smiling.

A cover was a cover after all, especially one as good as Regina Mills, well known yet reclusive planner of all important events in Storybrooke. And if she smelt nice pressed along Emma's side, what of it? It was a hard job, but someone did have to do it.

*

The party seemed to break up while Emma wasn't looking, quickly leaving them in a half empty room that was beginning to look a little worse for wear.

"It was a pleasure seeing you tonight," Regina was saying, shaking hands and farewelling yet more people, before turning back to Emma with a satisfied sigh. After a beat, she peered slyly over her shoulder and then grabbed Emma's hand. "Think we can sneak away without being seen?"

Without waiting for a response, she started for an out of the way corner, tugging Emma along behind her.

"Are you sure you don't need to say goodbye to anyone else?" Emma asked with a laugh and a longing look back at prominent businessman Mr Gold who was still lingering at the bar. She hadn't even had a chance to say hello.

"No, I think we've spoken to quite enough people for one night," Regina replied, and then veered sharply behind a large decorative plant, nearly tugging Emma clear off her feet.

Emma staggered with a yelp, only to find herself firmly caught in Regina's arms, with one of Regina's hands across her mouth the muffle her cry.

"Not to worry, Ms Swan," she whispered, eyes sparkling. "I've got you."

Emma's heart was pounding in her chest; she felt sure that Regina would be able to hear it, they were so close. As close as they'd been all evening, but somehow without the constant burble of chit chat and the clink of glasses over the top of everything, it felt much more intimate.

"I feel like I'm 13 and hiding at a school dance," Emma confessed quietly as she regained her footing.

"I know, it's delightful."

Emma ducked her head and peered through the leaves of their obliging plant cover. "Are you sure you want to risk being seen back here with me, won't people talk?" she joked, fingers clenching and unclenching at Regina's side.

"And what would they talk about? I'm simply enjoying the end of a successful evening with my beautiful date, who I've been telling everyone has been the light of my life these last few months. It's hardly a recipe for scandal, now is it?"

"I don't..." Emma started, and then stopped herself. She could feel the edge of her notebook digging into her thigh at an awkward angle from the way she was pressed into the little niche Regina had found, but it somehow didn't seem so important in the moment.

"Don't what, Ms Swan?" Regina prompted gently.

Emma raised her eyes to meet Regina's gaze head on, determined not to falter this time. She was a journalist, not a mouse, after all.

"I don't understand why you stopped them kicking me out."

Regina smiled softly and raised a hand to tuck Emma's hair gently behind her ear.

"I like beautiful things," she said, "and you, _Emma_ , are a beautiful thing."


End file.
